Spokesman, Catholic Church, Madhya Pradesh Father Anand Muttungal said, " This is a conspiracy by the state government to harass the Christian community and the minority commission has become a tool in the hands of the state government."

The proposal from the Madhya Pradesh Minority Commission is worrying.

Madhya Pradesh has over 2000 christian institutions.

Out of these Bhopal alone has 21 churches, 24 missionary schools and two colleges.

Catholics also run three hospitals in the state capital.

However, Minister, religious endowments Laxmi Kant Sharma said, "There is no communal feeling behind the move. The government takes care of Muslim properties as well as Hindu properties so Christian properties can also be looked after."

And while the government is playing down its move, saying the properties need state conservation, it has no real answers.

After all, it is also alleged that the VHP-RSS combine in the state itself gets huge amounts of funding from foreign donors.